As promised yesterday, here's the third part of a series of posts, providing you with insights on how "Deep Discoveries" finally made it to the download stores. In case you missed them, here are part 1 and part 2.

So, I had the master recordings from the artists and the cover artwork was done. Next on the list were mastering the files, determining the final tracklist/track order, setting up the promo and uploading the finalized release to my distributor.

As every artist has a different setup, a different skill level and (hopefully) a very unique signature sound, it makes sense to group a bunch of tracks in a meaningful order. Some tunes are deep, some are percussive, some are a bit heavy on the treble portion and so on. Once I had made my mind up which tracks Pesto EP001 should consist of, I tried to arrange them in a way that they would feature a nice dramaturgy when listening to them in a row. Similar to a DJ mix or a tune itself, you would have one tune with an intro function (most supposedly the deepest of the bunch), to be followed by the tunes that have higher energy levels. You would also make sure that the tunes were not too far off from each other soundwise, adding bass or treble on one tune while cutting them on another one, for instance.

One could argue that this approach does not make much sense in times of single-track downloads but that's part of the philosophy on Pesto - I want it that way. I'm not offering a collection of tunes that were thrown together in one place indifferently. I want to offer a product that makes sense, that creates a certain atmosphere and evokes certain emotions - a compilation of music I enjoy and think you as a customer would enjoy, as well. I do things with love and dedication and compiling such an EP is no different.

Mastering the tracks

After I had the playlist set, I went to adjust the files soundwise. "In Pieces", the lovely opener of this EP by "Deep In Calm" was well-produced but very low in volume. On the other hand, the solid "One Night Stand" by "Processing Vessel" had already seen a mastering engineer and arrived here in its final state. The term "mastering" (or postproduction) here refers to a process that - very roughly speaking - irons out those differences and gets all tunes on a similar level volume- und soundwise. There are other meanings to that word but that will be a different post here soon.

These days, "mastering" is often misunderstood as "make it as loud as possible" or "make it sound like the big tunes on Beatport". Making a tune screaming loud is no problem from a technical point of view. Seeing it from a musical angle though, you'd still want all those little details to be hearable. This is what gives life to a tune and makes it breathe. When going through 300 new tracks on Beatport though, you are likely to skip those that are lower in volume. Since this is not only limited to electronic music but to recorded music in general (with the exception of classical music and Jazz), a phenomenon called "loudness war" is being encountered since the 1980ies. If you're familiar with Metallica's "Death Magnetic" album, you've just found one of the infamous and questionable "winners" of said war.

What I'm usually aiming at is an RMS level of -6dB but that also highly depends on the source material. Even for somebody who is not familiar with "RMS", "peak level" or "decibel (dB)", it's obvious that a chilled Lounge track has different requirements than a club banger. Keeping this in mind, I started to process the files, listening to and comparing against reference tunes every now and then. When I re-imported the mastered tunes into my "Pesto EP001" playlist, I noticed the tracks would not match when listening in one go. I did a second mastering session, now not paying attention to the EP as a whole rather than individually adjusting the tunes and consequently running into the "Beatport sound" trap: the tunes were loud now but sounded like dog poo - flat and lifeless but in your face like the smell of the former. I suddenly also noticed clicks and pops that hadn't been there before, so I double-checked the source files and they were all fine. The unwanted artefacts were due to beginner mistakes such as wrong settings on my mastering equipment.

I was undecided if I should cry, smash my fist on my keyboard, kick the computer under my desk or do all three things at once. I chose a different option though. After smoking a cigarette and drinking a beer, I decided to master the tunes a third time. After all, neither the keyboard nor the computer were to blame - it was solely my fault. As it showed a few days later, this was the right decision and when the artists returned their thoughts on the master, I knew everything was fine.

Reading the above can easily give you the impression that this process takes just minutes. It's not: depending on the source material, finding the right processors and settings may take 15 minutes or more, rendering the files takes some time, cropping them to remove unwanted silence or applying fades takes some more.
As I'm located in a residential area though, I can do these kind of tasks only during daytime when my neighbours are at work. Furthermore, my ears aren't good for mastering in the morning (they are too sensitive then) nor are they late at night. In the end, I'm not a dedicated mastering engineer rather than some kind of one-trick pony. So there's a timeframe of maybe three or four hours in the early afternoon when my hearing is just perfect for mastering duties.

It's also important to work on something totally different when you're stuck since trying to make it happen when the surrounding isn't right is like running against a wall. On top of that, I cannot spend my afternoons with mastering only. I have remix jobs to finish on time, reply to emails, maintain my social networks, buy food and drinks, etc. I had informed the artists of "Deep Discoveries" of the new release date (8th September 2010) and I was determined to not delay it one more time.

Connecting with the world outside

The thing is: there are good points in time to put out a release and there are dates being suboptimal. Beginning of the month would usually be considered a good occasion: people have money to buy music, DJ charts are being compiled, podcasts and mixes are being made, magazines are being printed. If you want your release to develop the most possible friction while keeping an eye on your marketing budget (or while having zero budget except your workforce), these are all points to keep track of.

It's not enough to just put out a great release though. A person I've used to make music with for a couple of years said "good music will sell by itself" or more generalized "a good product will sell by itself". If that actually was true, Coca Cola, Porsche or Apple wouldn't have an advertising budget at all. Nearly everybody knows these brands, yet still, these companies spend millions on advertising and marketing year by year. People will need to know that they can buy your product, they need to know you exist, they need good reasons why they should give you their hard-earned money.

In this niche of the music business Pesto Music operates in, a lot of marketing and actions of "to get known and raise awareness" is done by so-called tastemakers. These can be club and radio DJs, podcasts, blogs, magazines, celebrities (nobody would care about Ke$ha if she had not been supported by - please forgive me - Paris Hilton) and other multiplicators. The more often you come across "Deep Discoveries", the more often you hear people you trust talk about it, the more likely you will go and find out more about this issue and eventually end up buying the music. It's how we humans work - we're following the herd.

What I am doing to achieve this is sending out free copies of the release to the group of people mentioned above prior to the offical release date. It's part of a process called "promotion" and the free copies are therefore called "promos". These guys will listen to the music and reply with their thoughts: if they like it or not (and which track or version is their favourite), if they will use it for their mixes or chart it in their monthly DJ charts.
One DJ including one of the tunes in his or her chart makes a statement to his or her fans: "These 10 tracks are what I think is the best music this month (and this Pesto tune is one of them)". Given that DJ has 1.000 fans in his network, charting a tune equals to 1.000 possible contacts with people who would not have known Pesto before (highly simplified, of course). Do you remember the word "multiplicator" from above? You've just read a possible definition. This goes even further if a couple of DJs start charting a tune on a website such as Resident Advisor: RA compiles monthly charts that compute all contributed Top10s, reaching even more people beyond the group of followers of a certain DJ.

Push that button

Those of you knowing me in person are aware of the fact that Sundays are sacred for me, even though I'm not religious. It's the only day I can spend with my wife, leave the computer off and do something totally different. For you though, dear readers of pesto.de who have waded through this admittedly more technical and geeky part of our behind-the-scenes, I will make an exception.

Tomorrow, you will find here part 4, dealing with the odds of promo mailouts such as messing up background info on artists and being considered a spammer, why I need to convert WAV files to 320kBits and 64kBits, how Pesto saves money by having built a custom promo system and how my narcisstic needs are being satisfied. I will also post some nude pictures of me (I won't and you would not want to see that, but it maintains the tension, doesn't it?).

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Following up on part 1 of my little piece on how Pesto releases are made, here's the second part with more gory details and more classified information you won't even find on Wikileaks.

So, after the name was set, I was still undecided about it - I found it a bit too cheap and too obvious. Surely, it was better than simply "Deep Tunes" but it also wasn't something to blow my mind, to get me excited. When I shared my concern with others, they told me they liked many of my concepts - just after I had explained it to them. Apparently, when developing new ideas, I'm usually digging too deep. I'm trying to make up associations and deep links between items that only a person would understand who had gone as deep into the matter as myself.

That's not how marketing works though. Sophisticated concepts are great and can be jaw-dropping but very often, they won't work in the first second. And this very second is crucial when trying to get the attention of fans, listeners and possible customers of Pesto Music. "Deep Discoveries" remained therefore.

Up next was creating the cover artwork and a general identity for the Pesto EP. The graphics should be timeless so that nobody would be tired seeing it after one year. The cover design should look great in fullscreen mode as well as on shops' web pages. While my distributor demands the artwork to be 1440 pixels wide, Beatport displays them at only 80 pixels wide when browsing through their catalogue in list view. To put it differently and to make you imagine better: think of a road sign that's approx. 60cm in diameter such as a speed limit sign (they look like this at least here in Europe):

And now imagine the same sign 18 times smaller. That's the size cover artworks are displayed in Beatport's list view in relation. It's this size (yes, there is a picture below):

Back in the good ol' days of 12" covers, designers could go fully creative on huge areas of carton. Quite obviously, this is not the case with covers for digital downloads. So far, I've designed the digital cover artwork for Pesto myself. You will find that the artwork for the first releases look quite awful, changing for the better beginning with Pesto 005 by Babak Shayan, our very first digital-only release. You can see I wasn't satisfied with the look still and that's why the covers for Pesto singles kept changing until I came to a design that I found functional and decent looking, first introduced with Pesto 013 by Replika.

As much as I love doing as many things myself as I can, I surely also recognized that I'm not a graphic designer. I know a few things about colour rooms, CMYK, contour trapping and the likes but graphics are not my profession. I needed to hire a designer.

As I knew a couple of great creatives, I thought I'd make a contest among some designers (it's called "pitch") and let the best one win. In order to draw more attention to the Pesto EP and the label in general, I had in mind to publish the designers' sketches on the Pesto Music fanpage on Facebook, embed a poll there and let you, the fans and Pesto followers decide. I thought "if 7 designers enter the pitch and each of them sends all their friends to /welikepesto in order to cast their votes, I have countless new fans, raise awareness for both the label and the designers' work, fans are part of the whole process (say crowdsourcing light) and I'll have the best possible design meeting the consent of a majority, the producers get exposed to people who would otherwise have never heard of them - everybody's happy, I will be a millionaire and retire".

Well, those were not exactly my thoughts - but except for the millionaire part, that's how I imagined the whole thing. Wrong!

One of them never got back after sending a reminder when the deadline had passed. Another one went on holidays just to send me a few sketches after returning that did meet not any of the criteria I had written down. The next one suddenly had too many clients (I really want to meet your sales rep - somebody who's able to acquire clients for weeks of work in just a few days, wow!), another one suggested pink covers for housier releases, even though the first drafts hadn't been that bad and another one found the deadline too close (which actually was a proper excuse - I had intended to release the first Pesto EP in early June and the deadline was just two weeks ahead then). Remember the part from above dealing with great concepts that are too difficult to catch up with? Yeah, this pitch was a great idea - it just did not work out.

So eventually, I found the right guy for the job - or better put, he was recommended by one of my buddies here from Cologne (hvala Danilo!). David van Stephold (you will read more about him and find some samples of his work here soon) was the only guy who actually got back with a sketch, explaining what he had in mind and why he designed the artwork the way he did. He's living just around the corner so what could I wish more for?

To be honest, I did not like the artwork that much in the beginning. But the more people I showed it and got great response, the more I understood that again, my concepts (and expectations therefore) were simply too complicated. David's design just made "boom", it clicked with people, they liked it lots.

While all this was in the works, I mailed the artists from the release, announcing release dates that would be delayed again and again. I revised the tracklist, changed the track order, asked the artists for final master recordings (while one of them was writing his university exams at that very moment) until I finally got the artwork and the master recordings.

Next on my list was mastering the tunes, entering them into the distributor's system and into my label software, setting up the promo campaign and making some buzz on my social networks so that people would become aware of our new baby, the Pesto EP. As you can imagine, again, this did not go without minor hiccups and in part 3 of this behind-the-scenes, we will finally arrive at what I'm currently doing for the release that will be out on Beatport excl. the 8th September 2010 if nothing goes wrong (fingers crossed). Tomorrow, you will read why I was mastering "Deep Discoveries" three times, how I messed up some info on an artist and why I nearly smashed my computer but eventually felt very content. Stay tuned.



speed limit sign picture source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Maxima_velocidad.png

related tags: pep001 deep in calm norman creed patryk molinari yamil colucci processing vessel christos fourkis behind the scenes

Remember when we announced a new release format, the Pesto EP? That was end of April, in other words - four months ago. Quite a long time in this business. You might be wondering what took us so long and I have the great pleasure to give you some behind-the-scenes insight, straight from Jon Silva's desk. Taking Pesto EP001 - Deep Discoveries as an example, let me explain the steps required to make such a product.

Everything starts with the artists: I know a couple of people whose music I like and whom I'm in touch with on a regular basis. These guys do send me their unreleased music and if I like it, I'll try to sign it to Pesto.

The second group are producers that I haven't been in contact with before and who send me demos. My task here is being a filter: not to judge between good or bad music but to tell if I like a tune or if I don't. Tracks that I'm rejecting might be the favourite of the next A&R or label manager so it's not automatically a sign they're bad ones - I just don't feel them, I don't feel they belong to Pesto, I don't see them on the horizon I envision for the label.

When signing such tunes, I mostly do not have a specific release in mind. Very often, I'm saying to myself "this could be a good one for the next 2.0 compilation" or "this one has great remix potential but does not feel like a Pesto single, let's put it in the 'Pesto EP inbox' playlist".

The third group are producers that start following me on Soundcloud, for instance and I'm checking their profile and listen to their tunes - just to discover true pearls of (mostly) young talents. I will then try to license these tunes for Pesto, as well - usually also not with any specific product in mind.



This is a constant process throughout the year, it's part of my daily business so to say. Another constant in my daily routine is - believe it or not - listening to music. When answering emails, doing administrative things, reading news and blogs, I have music running in the background. Very often, I listen to podcasts and DJ mixes I get sent. On other occasions, I listen to the "inbox" playlist mentioned above in loop mode. Some subconscient process starts then and my mind begins to associate one tune with another, virtually compiling playlists of tunes that match a certain vibe or otherwise belong to each other.

I would then start grouping these tunes in new playlists and try to develop a product that eventually can be bought on all major download stores.

Back in April, I already had a playlist for the first Pesto EP. The playlist consisted of raw tunes - some of them unmastered WAV files, some of them crappy MP3s (that's still good enough to get the picture). I listened to that playlist repeatedly and tried to find a catchy term for what I was listening to. Sure, they all were deep but "Deep Tunes" is not much of a good EP title, now is it? I'm also a fan of twists with language (I'm much better at it in german, believe me) so I went searching for a nice alliteration. Since all of these tunes were not by artists I was already working with, rather than new discoveries, "Deep Discoveries" was the way to go. I asked my wife how she liked the name and a couple of other people, doing market research if you will. They all liked it.

The next steps were designing the cover artwork to give an easily recognizable face to this music and the Pesto EP itself. I would exchange all the paperwork with the artists, asking them to send hi-resolution files of their tracks, infos about themselves so I could use it for promotion, mastering the tracks, speaking with my distribution about the best strategy to place the Pesto EP, and so on. And this is where the trouble started, but that's another story which you will read here tomorrow in part 2 of this little behind-the-scenes write-up.

related tags: pep001 deep in calm norman creed patryk molinari yamil colucci processing vessel christos fourkis behind the scenes

If your musical preferences reach beyond Deep House, into the realm of more clubby, proggy sounds and the name "Fady Ferraye" doesn't ring a bell, you're doing something very wrong.

Beirut-born and Amsterdam-based Fady is one of the hottest producers at the moment with his tunes being regularly showcased on BBC's infamous Radio One, frequent guest in the world's DJ charts, mixes and playlists. His standing is definitely not due to being the usual "hyping myself on social networks" guy - far from that! Fady Ferraye has been constantly building his career since he began contributing to the world of club music in 1990.

Yes kids, that's 20 years in the business - long before Beatport, let alone the MP3 file format, was invented. That may be one of the reasons why Fady is still sticking to the "black gold" and spins vinyl-only sets to this day. He has been playing a major role in the Middle East's club scene not only by putting out oriental-injected music but also by being the only DJ who held residencies in all three Lebanon's super-clubs at the same time (namely B018, Strange Fruit and the Basement, two of which were voted best clubs worldwide in DJ Mag's annual Top100). For more than 5 years, he has been a resident at Amsterdam's renowned NL Club.
Glamorous nights have included performing at an afterhours party for P Diddy and headlining Fashion TV's Black Diamond Boat, while DJ bookings over the years have seen him perform alongside Tiesto, Paul Oakenfold, Deep Dish, Sander Kleinenberg, Above & Beyond, Judge Jules, Dave Seaman, Marco V and many more.

Fady Ferraye also runs his own show "Goosebumped" on Frisky Radio and I had the great honour to be his guest (here's a free download of my Goosebumped set).

When searching his name on YouTube, besides Fady's own channel, you will find numerous clips from his gigs all over west asian countries. Pay attention to the euphoric crowd with their hands in the air and shouting "Fady, Fady, Fady" und you will get an idea of the vibe Fady Ferraye brings to a club. If there is a term for uniting people in the name of music, regardless of their origin, the colour of their skin or their religion - if there are words for the bridge between the western hemisphere, its tradition in electronic music and clubbing and the rich culture of young Lebanese, Jordans, Arabs and many more - these words must be Fady Ferraye.

As a label owner, you could only dream of having such an artist in your roster. Well, the dream came true for Pesto Music when Fady signed his outstanding "Amman" tune to our label. "Amman" got released via our 2.0 compilation "A Jar Of Fresh Pesto" (the name was Fady's idea, too by the way!) in 2009. Pretty soon, we will release the single with more classy remixes here on Pesto.

As an artist, you feel just very proud when being approached by Fady asking you to remix one of his tunes. You cannot deliver anything that's below superior. That's what I just tried with "She Bounces", released on the italian Presslab imprint. I tried to come up with the most energetic vibe, doing the original tune and Fady himself the justice they deserve. I'm quite happy with the mix and hope you like it as much as I enjoyed making it!

You can do Fady a big favour by buying the tune(s) below and also by voting for him in DJ Mag's Top 100 poll: www.top100djs.net

related tags: fady ferraye Jon Silva remix beatport

As a regular visitor of pesto.de (or pestomusic.com), you've surely come across the name "The Disclosure Project" a couple of times. The two UK-based deepheads Paul Jones and JP Phillipe did not only a lovely remix for our Pesto 012 release by Cloudsteppers - we also had the honour to release an exclusive PestoMix by Mr. Jones not so long ago.
Besides that, "The Disclosure Project" and their equally-named label have been a constant of the Deep House scene for many years, loved by many including us here at Pesto for their highly musical output that not only claims to be according to quality but proves that claim by putting out one killer release after another.

"Sleep Cycle 5" is one of those tunes I immediately fell in love with when I heard it for the first time a few months ago. Deep, lush and with amazing chord progressions of that kind that will make shivers running down your spine. When speaking with Paul about a possible remix for that tune, I told him it would be hard to come up with a decent remix unless I would not destroy the intense feeling of "Sleep Cycle 5". I've tried a couple of options until I eventually decided to go with just the chord progressions, speed the whole thing up and give it a totally new vibe.

The hot July here in Cologne put me in 100% summer mode and so I tried to transform "Sleep Cycle 5" into a summer hymn, good for all outdoor occasions when great music with a positive vibe is needed and pushing the energy levels will raise an audience's arms.

I hope to have accomplished this mission but hear and judge yourself.

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I've had the great pleasure to remix the tune "Moscow After Autumn Rain" by Elastic Sound from, yeah, Moscow.

"Hasn't Elastic Sound just remixed a Pesto tune?" you're asking. Exactly, Elastic Sound's "Modern Soul Remix" of our current release Pesto 013 by Replika is still in Beatport's Deep House charts.

Back on topic, my "Hi NRG Mix" is a bit different from what you're used to, maybe reminds you slightly more of earlier Soda Inc. tunes such as "Across The Ocean" as an example. I have to admit that I have a weakness for Italo Disco and namely Hi NRG stuff from the 1980ies so that may explain it. Nevertheless, I'm in good company when you take a look at the other remixers on this great release on the Aquamarine label.

Check out the mixes on the Beatport player below:

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Here's a fast-forward of our upcoming single, Pesto 013, by Switzerland's Replika. The EP is named "Inner Visions" and contains two original tunes by Replika plus remixes by Elastic Sound (Deepology, Aquamarine/Moscow) and Jon Silva.

Please enjoy now (oh, and big spasibo to Cloudsteppers for the 8bit outro!):

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A sunny weekend is ahead, drinks are in the fridge and you're doing countless sit-ups to get in shape for summer - what could be better than a new Jon Silva DJ mix? What about a brand new mix by Acryl's Da Funk to be followed by a brand new Jon Silva mix? Let me quote from Randy Seidman's page:

Today, Open House brings you exclusive sets by two artists who are synonymous with quality House Music…

The first hour is brought to you by Da Funk – The Swiss producer/DJ discovered the scene as a teenager nearly 20 years ago, and has been involved ever since. He started Acryl Music in 2004 which prides itself on deep, techy, forward thinking & innovative House music – and if you are into quality deep, then you are likely to have heard his work.

Da Funk's tracklist:

01. Ark – Rising
02. Soul Minority – Get Together
03. Brendon Moeller – Phazed & Confused
04. Wagon Cookin – Fever (Nacho Marco Remix)
05. Allen – Freezing (Felipe Venegas Flute Break Remix)
06. DJ Bee – Ten Years (Jesus Gonsev Remix)
07. Hey O Hansen – Moon (Jack Is A Simple Fella Mix)
08. Jim Rivers – By Any Means (Luna City Express Remix)
09. Kevin Yost – Too Cool For Me
10. Jay Shepheard – Arrowhead County (Roberto Rodriguez Remix)
11. John Daly – Do It
12. Nomi & Rampa – Inside (&Me Remix)
13. Paronator – September (Da Funk’s Freefloater Dub)

The show’s closing hour is mixed by German production master Jon Silva. Also a veteran to the scene, Jon has been involved with the production and distribution of quality deep and tech house since the late 80’s and has a pile of 12 inch records to his name. In 2001 he developed his own imprint called Pesto, which first influenced my taste in deeper shades of house music. Enjoy!

Jon Silva's tracklist:

01. Ricardo Rueda – Summer Time
02. Fernando Mesa – Need U
03. Bucher & Kessidis – Central Park
04. Norman Creed & Patryk Molinari – Access
05. Berny – Shplatten (Joy Kitikonti Remix)
06. Coce Djz – Messing With My Mind
07. Piyush Awashti – Fragments (Santiago Garcia Remix)
08. Dan Curtin – Mr. Bean Do An E (DJ Madskillz Remix)
09. Ivan Weber – People Are Strange
10. Nick Fay – Progression (Jon Silva’s Rise & Fall Mix)

Just one thing though: I started releasing music in the late 1990ies, not 1980ies - I'm not THAT old as you'd guess from my wrinkles!;)

Here's the direct link to the episode. Make sure you also check out the other episodes of this brilliant weekly podcast, Randy has some really well known and interesting names up there.

related tags: Da Funk Jon Silva open house podcast randy seidman dj-mix

Shhhhhh...totally forgot to share this one with you: I had the honour to make a guest mix for Matty Gillespie's "Tru House" show on Ibiza Sonica. Matty was so nice to put up the whole one hour show on his Soundcloud account where you can stream and download the mix from. He also has other shows up there with great guest DJs such as Carlos Sanchez (8Bit) along with his own sets and productions (under the Agent Matteo moniker) - well worth a visit/follow!

Matty also maintains a dedicated "Tru House" Facebook group which you can find here: Tru House Radio show on Ibiza Sonica



Here's the track list:

Matty Gillespie Mix
01. Pablo Fierro - Check the boogie (Soul Minority Remix)
02. Mike Montano - Should Be Good (Yo funk Remix) (Low Flow Records)
03. Alex Celler - La Palma (Area Remote)
04. Santos - San Francisco (Noir Music)
05. Ross Couch - All At Sea (Karol XVII & MB Valence Remix) (Body Rhythm)

Jon Silva Mix
01. From P60 - Over The Sea (Jon Silva's Futuristic Funk Mix) [IRMA]
02. Ross Couch - Love At First Sight (Ross Couch Second Look Mix) [Body Rhythm]
03. Lea-D - Disco 3000 (Art Patrice Mix) [InDeep]
04. Vernon & Dacosta - Do It Again [Robsoul]
05. Tom Wax & Franksen - 2 The Rhythm [BigCity Tec]
06. Steve Lawler - Almerina [Harthouse Mannheim]

related tags: dj-mix radio show matty gillespie Jon Silva Ibiza Eivissa Ibiza sonica

Already out since 22nd of April, I'd like to introduce another remix of mine for the adorable Maria & Joel aka The Messenger from lovely Croatia.

Alongside great mixes of different tunes by Demarkus Lewis and Addex from Soul Industry's former releases, my stripped down House rework of "Free Your Mind" is available now on the "Soulflash Remixes Part 1" release. Check out the Beatport player below, the remix is exclusive on Beatport by now. "Soulflash Remixes Part 1" will be available on other stores soon.

related tags: The Messenger soul industries Jon Silva remix

Back in time, when I was young, slim and naive (I'm only naive these days) and music was pressed in grooves on a thing called vinyl, there were different formats of vinyl records.

You could get 7" singles, 12" maxi singles and 12" albums. Between maxi singles and albums, there also had been a niche called EP (aka extended play). The main difference between a maxi single and an EP used to be the track selection: while you would expect the radio version and some alternate mix on the B-side, 12" singles had an extended or Club mix on the A-side. In short, there were three or four versions of the same track on one piece of wax, sometimes, you'd also find a second tune rather than another remix.
The EP, on the other hand, held different tracks from the same artist or from various artists - a fact that made some people call the EP a "mini album". Please see this Wikipedia article for detailed info on the history of EPs.

Drum roll, please - curtain up, enter the Pesto EP!

You are familiar with our admittedly rare singles, our compilations such as "2.0", "toolbox" and "Beautiful & Timeless" and now is the time to get acquainted with our brand new Pesto EPs. These will feature four or five tracks from various artists (or maybe just one, in case we have five good tunes from one artist). They will sport a whole new design, different from our other releases, which is in the works currently. And they will work around two common problems: when releasing compilations with ten or more tracks, people often just pay attention to the first few tracks and miss the great stuff that comes later on. Especially DJs as buyers are mainly focused on single tracks rather than the whole track list dramaturgy our compilations feature. Another point is that people get easily bored by listening to six or seven different versions of the same tune, making it hard for them to decide which one they like best.

With the Pesto EP, we bring you a format that offers variety style- and sound-wise as different artists will have different vibes. With just five tracks contained, they also surrender to the usual DJ's attention span. And sometimes, an artist sends us a couple of tracks but there's only one that suits the Pesto vibe so it's difficult to compile a single, especially if the track is hard to remix. Should we ditch these artists? Hell no, we want to give exposure to every artist and tune that deserves it - even if it's only just one song!

So last but not least, the Pesto EP is also great news for our artists as they get featured the best way, have their music released quickly rather than having to wait for all the remixers until the single can be done. If there's demand for it, the track can be released along with remixes on a Pesto single later on still.

To say it with the words of a consultant: it's a win-win-win situation - you as our fan and customer, the artist as the supplier and backbone of the Pesto label and us as the label itself will all profit from the Pesto EP. After taking a break releasewise for nearly one year, you can be sure to expect a fireworks of new music from your most favourite label - Pesto Music!

More details to follow soon.

related tags: pestoep 2.0 toolbox beautiful & timeless

Oh, and another release that escaped my attention is a remix I did for swiss label 2Delicious. Please check out "Jon Silva's Reasonable Remix" of Mr. Moon feat. Linda Cushma's "Beautiful".

Also included are a bunch of other remixes previously unreleased, among them a great (as always) Ralf Gum rework. Here's that:

related tags: mr. moon linda cushma Jon Silva remix beatport

Another remix I have delivered recently has been released on Slovenia's Spherax label. This time, the job was for the notorious Ulusoy & Uysal guys from Turkey and my "The Mulder Remix" reveals a bit of the electro aspect of my split personality.

Oh, and thanks to Klemen, Evren and Sezer for their patience!

Check it out along with the rest of this great clubby pack on the Beatport player below:

related tags: ulusoy uysal spherax Jon Silva The Mulder remix beatport

Already out since February 25th but nonetheless still worth having a listen is my remix for Nick Fay's "Progression" on USB. Check out "Jon Silva's Rise & Fall Remix" and the other fine versions here:

related tags: Nick fay Jon Silva remix beatport

Holy Guacamole - more remixes coming your way! Sorry for all the Beatport player bombing but just today, another two of my remixes (that received great feedback from jocks all over btw) came out. So here's another dose of Jon Silva remix madness, this time for Zon feat Day-Z of USB from Bulgaria:



Are you already friends with us on Facebook? If not, you can do so now:)

related tags: zon Day-Z Jon Silva remix beatport

Just a short one to inform you that my remix for Little Nakoch, Nemus & dont's track "Murr" is out on Beatport. You can check out the original as well as the other great remixes on the release player below.

[update: "Murr" is now a featured release in Beatport's Deep House section. Yay!]

related tags: dont little nakoch nemus murr Jon Silva beatport

Oh, and not to forget "Enjoy This Trip", the tune I made with my to-be-wife Djazz is also out! Make sure you also check out the great remixes by Stan Kolev, BK Duke, Edel and Zon in the release player below:

related tags: djazz Jon Silva relaxators u.s.b. stan kolev bk duke edel eddie niguel zon

You've probably heard "Enjoy This Trip" on our music player or on our "2.0 - A Jar Of Fresh Pesto" compilation earlier this summer. Only due to our friendship with Relaxator's, home of the Underground Sound of Bulgaria, we "borrowed" the tune for our sampler.

The time has come to find a good home for the tune by Pesto's very own Djazz and Jon Silva. U.S.B. Digital (aka Underground Sound of Bulgaria) is said home and "Enjoy This Trip" encountered a warm welcome to the U.S.B. family and now finds itself in the good company of people such as Stan Kolev (Miami), BK Duke (Munich), Edel aka Eddie Niguel (Singapore) and Martin Dimitrov aka Zon from Sofia. Thanks to these guys, you can expect a great package on USB115, coming to your download store on January 13th.

As the promo campaign is already at full throttle, the first raving feedbacks are coming in. We'll post the reactions from DJs and tastemakers pretty soon! To shorten the period of waiting until the release date, U.S.B. was so kind to put up a couple of video clips including the tracks at full length. Make sure you subscribe to their YouTube channel as they offer a broad range of quality music.

Here's the original:



[update: we have set up a page with full length versions of all mixes, check it out here: http://pesto.de/EnjoyThisTrip ]

related tags: djazz Jon Silva relaxators u.s.b. stan kolev bk duke edel eddie niguel zon

Happy New Year to y'all - hope you enjoyed some relaxing days! :)

To begin 2010 with more musical output, here are two Jon Silva remixes for From P60. "Over The Sea" had been on From P60's acclaimed album "Realize" on Italy's IRMA Music which got released last March. The tune was released as a single with a couple of great remixes just today so make sure you check out Jon Silva's Soda Inc. Remix and Jon Silva's Futuristic Funk Remix on Beatport.

related tags: From P60 Irma remix

If you ever wanted to submit your tracks to Pesto Music, you would have different ways of doing so.

Many use our contact form and paste links to their demos there, some use yousendit, others contact us via our profile pages on social networks such as Facebook, twitter or myspace. We also accept CDs but with regards to the environment, we invite you to not involve a piece of plastic. There is just one no-go: attaching MP3 files to emails. These emails do not only clutter our mailbox but also increase the size of the mailbox file (and yes, it does have a limit). These emails go straight to the bin.

Today, we are adding another way of submitting your killer tunes: our dropbox on Soundcloud! It's free, easy to use, you can connect with other artists and labels and it looks pretty nice. We have added the Soundcloud dropbox to our imprint page (where you find our general demo submission policy).

For this news post, we had a copy made ;)

Send us your track

And now keep the smashers coming!

related tags: demo Submission dropbox soundcloud

Already in stores since March 9th 2009, we are proud to let you know that a Pesto tune has found its way onto the famous "Buddha Bar" compilation series.

DJ Ravin, of Mauritius origin, states on his website that his quest is "full of curiosity and passion" for "unknown sensations and ignored talent". While "sensation" and "talent" are with no doubt true for Pete Gust's remix of Rucyl's "Love In War", the words "unknown" and "ignored" have to be stripped off thanks to numerous weeks on DJ charts and sales sheets last year, including the top position on Beatport's DeepHouse charts last year.

Buddha Bar XI marks a stopover of the Buddha Bar movement, funny enough, this time staying in Kiev, the capital of Ukraine, place to be for Jon Silva recently and homebase of our exclusive partner Fly Music.

You can get Buddha Bar XI either on CD or as a digital download from your favourite store, in case you haven't yet!

related tags: buddha bar dj ravin Rucyl Pete Gust 2.0

In cooperation with our exclusive partner for Ukraine, Fly Music in Kiev, we are proud to announce three Jon Silva gigs this coming weekend!

First one will be in Zaporizhzhia on the 27th March. Jon Silva will be playing at "Music Hall". The second gig will be in Winnyzja's "Feride Plaza" on the 28th March. To round up the little Ukraine journey, Jon will be playing the last gig in Kiev's "Forsage" club on Sunday, the 29th.

[flash banner ad removed]

Please excuse the absence of news items starting tomorrow on Thursday through Monday.

related tags: Jon Silva ukraine

We told you about the remix Jon Silva did for Dimiz of the Kondukter crew based in Nish, Serbia. Apparently, the tune works quite well...hehehe! Check the vid, starting at 05:10 and pay attention to the crowd at around 07:42 (hint: put your hands up in the air)!



You can buy this remix on Beatport: Dimiz & Ogi Gee Cash - Vocalizer (Jon Silva's Vocalize This! Remix)

related tags: dimiz ogi gee cash remix Jon Silva

Beatportal.com, the community backend of Beatport have just launched a wiki for artists and labels a couple of days ago.

It is beyond our knowledge why artwork and artists appearing on the label have to be entered manually as Beatport's database should provide those connections - at least, it works within their shop. Yet still it's neat to have a dedicated wiki.

We will fill the gaps with content but we're also inviting you to add your rating (five out of five headphones, of course...hehe), missing artist connections and comments to our wiki page. You might also declare yourself a fan and show some love for Pesto. You will need to log in to do so but if you already have an account on Beatport, you can use those credentials.

So far, we experienced the whole thing to be a bit buggy still - connecting artists to the label only works every now and then, for instance. But we are sure these minor issues will be ironed out within brief and might be due to our configuration.

related links:
Pesto Music on Beatport
Pesto Music on Beatportal's wiki page
Use the board, young Skywalker!

related tags: beatport beatportal pesto wiki

Subsky, the charming Istanbul resident with countless releases on renowned labels such as Urbantorque, Forensic and Acryl also provides a long list of smashing remix works.
christBesides his tunes appearing in hundreds of DJ sets and on high profile compilations (Ministry of Sound, Global Underground and Universal to name but a few), he also contributed to our Pesto 010R release "New Way" by From P60.

It was about the time to give something in return and that's how Jon Silva remixed "This Is True". Original, Ryan Mishkin and Jon Silva remixes were just released through Miami's Dutchie Music and without any doubt, this one is going to burn.

Check out the whole release on Beatport and make sure you have it in your box for the next gig.

related tags: Subsky Jon Silva dutchie music remix

The "Islands" CD series is a cooperation between Big City Beats and King Kamehameha Beach and has succeeded not only to follow the success of other Eivissa-centered compilations but to reach even further.

King Kamehameha in Frankfurt was elected "Germany's most beautiful Open Air Venue" by the Cosmopolitan - Big City Beats have regular shows on Big FM, one of Germany's leading FMs for Black Music and House.

The story of this compilation is made up of a careful track selection seeking for timeless DeepHouse classics rather than actual Club Hits, the excellent packing design, the authentic island vibe when you miss dancing in the sunset and an excellent DJ mix by Steve Blunt (resident of King Kamehameha). No wonder this series made it into the german compilation charts before and Vol. 05 was presented as Hot Pick on Germany's Pro7 TV network.

We're proud that Rucyl's "Love In War (Pete Gust's KID Remix)" made it onto this piece of art and enjoys the appropriate company of Masters at Work, Ralf Gum, Tiger Stripes, Scope and Spirit Chaser to name but a few.

You can preview the CD's contents here - the info text is in german only.

related tags: Rucyl Pete Gust compilation Big City Beats Big FM Ibiza Eivissa king kamehameha steve blunt ralf gum tiger stripes maw louie vega pro7 pro sieben

Jon Silva aka the Mulder is in for a guest mix at Zach DeVincent's Paradigm show on Frisky Radio.

Jon delivers a two hours-mix starting with lovely deep Tech, shifting to Tech House the US way and finally evolving in neo-trancish armageddon.
You will hear a couple of unreleased tunes (some of them to be released in brief such as Da Funk's "Roasted" on Traxx 004 and the Clap Clap Mix of Sandra Lima's "Higher") as well as some classics such as James Holden's epos "A Break In The Clouds". Of course, Jon's 2007 smasher "I Take You Out To Space" and his remix of "Sharing Transparently" for 1st Class, that was also sticked to Beatport's #1 in DeepHouse for weeks is being featured, too. Enjoy two hours of shameless self promotion. ;)

Please find the track list below:

01. Villa Lupos - The Mulder
02. Housetrap (Jon Silva's Dub Trip) - JP&Kris Mil
03. Out 2 Space 2007 - The Mulder
04. Driftin' - Cooccer
05. Inside - Ronan
06. Woman Of The Sun (Francois Dubois Sunshine Vocal) - Onionz
07. Roasted - Da Funk
08. Here I am (Shur-I-kan Stripped Dub) - Fred Everything feat. Lisa Shaw
09. Sharing Transparently (Jon Silva's Deep House Mix) - 1st Class
10. Technical Emergency - L.E.O.
11. Get Fresh (Jon Silva's Freshhh Remix) - Aki-Tek
12. Enjoy This Trip - Jon Silva with Djazz
13. Roasted (Jon Silva's Replay) - Da Funk
14. Higher (Jon Silva's Clap Clap Mix) - Sandra Lima
15. Never Felt This This Way (Behrouz and Andy Caldwell Toronto Mix) - Knight Keys
16. Greece 2000 (Maarcos Remix) - Those Usual Suspects
17. The Journey - Cirez D
18. Beauty of Silence - Andrea Doria & LXR aka Lützenkirchen
19. A Break In The Clouds - James Holden

The Paradigm show will begin at 11:00am PST (08:00pm CET, to see your time zone, click here).

Tune in here, Frisky offers stream formats for nearly any player and connection bandwidth. Feel free to visit the forums and leave some feedback there!

related tags: Jon Silva The Mulder Frisky radio show dj-mix

From beatportal.com:

Club World Awards 2008 winner for best club, New York hotspot Cielo celebrates its 5th anniversary with a double-disc release that documents the club’s musical journey of the past five years.

Due out on July 8th on Tommy Boy Records, resident DJs Nicolas Matar and Willie Graff wrap it up with a neat little bow in a “then” and “now” disc format, including the latest tracks from Tommy Boy artists Ultra Naté and Louie Vega, remixes from Charles Webster, Carl Craig and Justin Martin, and a techno-friendly, soulful deep house sound that Cielo is famous for.

We're proud that Rucyl's "Love In War" (Pete Gust's KID Remix) also made its way onto this awesome compilation! Congrats to Cielo!

Visit Cielo's web site here.

related tags: Rucyl Pete Gust Cielo compilation

After last year's summer of remixes (pt. 1 and pt. 2) was quite successful for Jon Silva, this year is not any worse.
Jon has been asked to remix tunes by Scope on Urban Torque, Andy Sant on Detroit's Kolour Recordings, Orlando Vaughan on Duff Note, Aki-Tek on Red King/Ministry of Sound and Sebastian Davidson on both New York City's Glideslope and our neighbours Clubstar.

Some of those mixes are already finished (despite some took ages - sorry Ateka), some are work in progress. As soon as these releases will be available, we will let you know and provide further information. So long, please find out more about these excellent artists and labels by clicking the links - we're sure you like their stuff!

related tags: remix Jon Silva scope urban torque andy Sant kolour orlando vaughan duff note aki-tek red king Ministry of sound sebastian Davidson glideslope clubstar

Holy shyte, if 2008 starts like this, what's ahead?:D

6 out of 13 tunes are already gaining chart positions on Beatport. As we're really proud, we want to share the news with you so here they are seperated by genre:

in Deep House: Rucyl - Love In War (Pete Gust's KID Remix) 11, Tina Valen - Discotime 22, Da Funk - Electronic Love 77, Sandra Lima - Higher (The Mulder's Up-A-Dub) 98

in House: Jon Silva - Aegean 28

in Tech House: Khaan - Pegasos (The Mulder's XX-File Remixx) 61

On the House charts of DJDownload.com, Replika's "Loveletter" climbs on 62, Robin Rush's "Into You" on 90, Rucyl enters on 95. We're also in the charts on Traxsource (on 78) and on Juno Download (on 7 in Deep House, on 28 in the overall charts) with the whole album. And my good friend Ricardo Torres just tells me that we're also part of the "Weekly Essentials" on Traxsource with Phonic Funk's "On Top". If we should have missed on something (chart positions, DJ playlists, etc.), please post it in the comments!

One more thing: Jon Silva's P2P remix for Cristian Paduraru is also in the charts: #26 on Beatport's Tech House list.

Congratulations to our artists & big thanks to all those supporting excellent music!

related tags: pestolp002

As announced earlier this year, Jon Silva was asked to remix one of Cristian Paduraru's tracks. "Sharing Transparently" already saw a couple of remix treatments from all over, so now it was about the time to add some Pesto topping.

The release on Christian Records [CRO48RMX27] is a Beatport Exclusive and comes in three different flavours: Jon Silva's Deep House mix deals with trippy and dubby elements on a straight House beat, there's a Chill Out mix and a dub mix that's being reduced to the beats and bass line of the original remix.

buy this release on beatport.com

As you might have noticed before, there's is something like a big, international family of House music heads. One of our brothers in this family is Da Funk's Acryl Music from Switzerland - a label we keep supporting because we love the guy and we love the music! Da Funk has already remixed Babak Shayan's Azadi on Pesto 005, contributes to the "2.0" compilation with a massive tune (Electronic Love) and will have a banging release on Traxx in January.

Another brother in music is Vyach, our "Cloudsteppers" guy from Ukraine who's also on "2.0" and he's been doing a remix for Acryl Music. The track in question is "Dig Dis" by Da Funk himself.

The reason we're telling you all this? Well, the Cloudsteppers remix made it onto the ChillHouse edition of the Café Del Mar compilation. And as Cloudsteppers will be releasing an album on Pesto in 2008, we couldn't think of any better promotion for that.

Congratulations to Acryl Music (yes, it's fantastic, indeed!) and to the Cloudsteppers! Well done, guys.

Here's an interview that Angel Frank did with Soda Inc. (Jon Silva & Babak Shayan) in Kavala, Greece this summer. Please find the english version below or on Angel's myspace page, the link to the original greek version on e-djs.gr is at the bottom of this post.

1) How did you meet and when did you start to produce and dj together as Soda inc.?

Jon: Together we started in 2001 I think. We had been working for the same label, in the same office. We started to work on some remixes, our first track was produced in a few hours and after that we stuck together.

2) Tell me a few things about your 2nd album (Inner Vision). Imagine that I am someone who don't know Soda inc. What am I going to hear?

Jon: After Full Moon (their 1st album) we decided that we should put a new level. Full moon was more instrumental with less vocals, but we love vocals. You know, we listen to pop music and everything that is good so the 2nd album should be less house, less dance, more Soda inc., which is like a mix of different genres. We didn't had something like a plan. We were just sitting together, drinking wine and making tracks and at the same time we were deciding whether the tracks should be part of the album, or not. Babak met some guys from Jamaica and we recorded some stuff, so we put all this stuff together and made our 2nd album.

3) What do you believe about the illegal downloading? Do you think that is going to destroy electronic dance music?

Babak: I think that it is about music in general. It depends on which country we are talking about, because last year I was in Kiev and the people there, download music because they can't do otherwise. I don't think that is going to destroy electronic music especially because in Europe and u.s.a. the people there, buy more digital stuff. So I don't have a problem with it.

Jon: May I add something? Back in the days, when I was in school, everybody was copying Michael Jackson's albums, they putted them in tape, these days in the hard disks, but the people who are really fans of the music will still buy it, because they want to have the real thing, they want to support the artist. So, filesharing has been existing for ages. For me, it's better when someone downloads my tracks. I prefer it from not having them at all.

4) What about myspace? Have you been helped by it, either as djs, or as producers?

Jon: Actually, and I am speaking for both of us, we have met so many talents via myspace, you know people who make music from every corner of the world. I believe that myspace is a very good opportunity for new producers to meet people and spread their music. I also believe that turning a label into a digital label like Pesto music, is a normal consequence, because you meet people who write music from Ukraine, Kiev, and you say 'oh my god there is a talent' and you sign them. And you do that not just because they produce music, but also because you wouldn't had the chance to meet them otherwise. So it's a really good thing actually.

5) What's your best gig so far? Where do you enjoy your sets most?

Babak: I think it's Greece, because we love Greece, we love playing here, the crowd loves our music, which we really appreciate it, because in Germany, the people there are not that much into the music, they are more into the drugs, into techno and they don't give a shit about music. They just go to the club and wait till the drugs start to work. In countries like Greece and also in former east European countries like Serbia the people are into the music and you can feel that. They appreciate what we are doing.

6) What about minimal? What's your opinion about this trend? Does it influence you or just, you know, you don't even bother?

Babak: I'll just say, MINIMAL KILLS MUSIC (laughs)

Do you share the same opinion Jon?

Jon: In general, yes. Every kind of music has bad records and good records, so the most minimal tracks, at least for us, are boring. But there are some good tracks that we use to play and they definitely influence us. The next Soda inc. album won't be a minimal album, but it will include some minimal elements. But even these elements, will have a Soda inc. touch. In general, we are not into the minimal scene.

7) Do you wish to play in some place, where you have never played before?

Babak: There are a lot of places where we want to play, I think that especially u.s.a. is a very big market for our music and I wish we could have a kind of us tour or whatever next year maybe. I also think that in Europe, we would like to play in lots of countries, except Germany! Also in UK we'd love to play. Everywhere, where people loves music.

8) What technology do you use in order to play music? Do you love the good old vinyl, do you mix with cds, or you are into the late technology like serato, ableton live and other stuff?

Babak: I like vinyl very much. I play with vinyl and cd and don't want to use laptop when djing. Performing live is a whole different thing and the laptop there is most useful. But as far as it concerns djing, I love to play mainly with vinyl.

Jon: You know, in this marriage between Babak and me, I am more into the earlier technology. I use to play with programs like final scratch and that's because I like to have control over the things, I hate carrying stuff, vinyl is very expensive and with all this digital stuff, for me is really convenient. I love to play vinyl, it's a cool medium, but it is inconvenient, at least for me. I also carry cds with me, because 90% of my sets are my own music or something new or something that someone sent me. For example, three days ago, somebody sent me some good stuff and I said 'oh that's cool' and I just burned it on a cd and played it, which is cool and that's not going to happen with vinyl.

9) What are your plans for the future? Do you have something special in mind?

Babak: Actually we are recording the 3rd Soda inc. album right now and I don't know…just making music. Babak Shayan album is coming out, Soda inc. album and a lot of music. Jon runs 2 labels, I ran Shayan music so we have a lot of releases in mind.

10) And as a last question, I would like to know your hobbies.

Jon: Sex (laughs), good food, Greek Food (especially souvlaki!), and of course beautiful women

And you Babak?

Babak: Exactly the same!

Ok guys, thank you very much for the interview and I hope we will meet again and drink some wine!

Jon & Babak: We thank you!

I must let you know, that Jon & Babak are probably the most friendly and happy people I have ever met. We have been talking nearly for one hour but they have given me the feeling that I knew them for years. I hope to see you soon guys. Love from Greece. Aufwiedersehen.

click here to read the interview in greek

Note from Jon: we had the same pleasure talking to you! Hope to see you again soon!:)

The Mulder aka Jon Silva was constantly climbing the beatport charts (read below) and today, finally reached the top position of beatport's DeepHouse charts. We're sorry to say we kicked Jimpster off the #1 position (he's one of our most adored producers) but hey, we also like that news. :)

Meanwhile, Plastic City also released a new single by The Mulder, containing brand new versions and mixes of "I Take You Out To Space" by Cooccer, Jon Silva (umm...yes, you CAN remix yourself, especially if suffering from split personality) and two totally new and previously unreleased tracks. "I Take You Out To Space" was produced back in 2003 and originally released in 2005 - another proof that timeless music never grows old (and that's the philosophy we here at Pesto follow).

Further, Jon Silva's "I Want U" [Pesto 009] is still in the Top100 on stompy.com.
click here to buy at stompy.com
click here to buy at tracktidown.net
click here to buy at beatport.com
click here to buy at traxsource.com
click here to buy at iTunes Music Store

And as a last hint: beatport is finally accepting Paypal payments! As we know that many of you don't have a credit card, that's good news, indeed!

We just told you about the Mulder's release on Plastic City. Here's the link to the official page accompanying the release. Please find the info text below (quoted from Plastic City's web page):

The track "I Take You Out To Space" was originally released in 2005 - perfect at the time the sound of the nineties was up-to-date again. For Jon Silva, a Plastic City artist from the beginnings, this was a welcome occasion to reactivate his old alias “The Mulder”. This project was founded during the mystery boom in the mid-nineties, started by the the successful TV series “X-Files” among others. Its beginning found this project in the mid-nineties – at that time together with Len Faki- by the idea to set up with samples from X-Files chapters some tracks which are reflecting the panache of this time. The results of this project were the very successful single-releases "The Police" and "The Crab Candidate". This release includes brand new remixes of "I Take you Out To Space" as well as two new tracks.

click here to visit Plastic City and listen to the tracks

On the 2nd of September, we told you that Jon Silva's "I Want U" was entering the sales charts of stompy.com. Well, the good news continue:

Pesto 009 is still in the Top100 of stompy.com with a peak position of #64 last week! Thank you all for your support!
click here to buy at stompy.com
click here to buy at tracktidown.net
click here to buy at beatport.com
click here to buy at traxsource.com
click here to buy at iTunes Music Store

Jon wasn't lazy meanwhile and made a 2007 version of his smasher "I Take You Out To Space" that was released via Plastic City under his "The Mulder" moniker back in 2003. The tune is part of "Plastic City.Shape", a compilation mixed by "Evil" Eddie Richards, a UK Tech House icon.

The 2007 version of "I Take You Out To Space" by The Mulder has been gaining positions on beatport.com quickly - it's on #9 of the DeepHouse charts, once more (...*cough*, sounds familiar ;) ...) turning it into the best selling Plastic City release at the moment. (Talking of the "Babe-A-Pella" of Soda Inc.'s "Night Fever" - we just learned that Hernan Cattaneo also loves to play it).

There's also an upcoming release by "The Mulder" on Plastic City in brief containing more remixes of "I Take You Out To Space" (by rising talent "The Cooccer" who will have an album release on Traxx very soon) and two brand new choons! More details will follow when the release is available as an exclusive via beatport.com and tracktracker.com next week.

and the remix story continues...

Jon has finally finished his two remixes for Nikola Gala's Escada Music label: Jon delivered both a deeper and slightly tighter mix for Nikola's "Close To You". The "Chalkidiki Day Mix" is perfect for beach bars or sunny car rides while the "Thessaloniki Night Mix" is your pick for clubs. Soundwise, it's not a hard guess that Jon has been inspired by his recent stays in Greece - so look forward to some sunny vibes coming up on Escada by mid August.
In return, we're also proud to announce to have a Nikola Gala remix for the upcoming single of From P60 on Pesto 011.

Another remix Jon had been requested to do already back in May that finally sees the light of the day is for Romania's Christian Paduraru. "Sharing Transparently", originally being a deep Progressive tune turned into a Dub monster after Jon's treatment. Christian seems to be happy because here's what he wrote: "Wow Jon, an inspiring wise use of elements with a hot steady deep groove!!" We're happy you like it, Christian! Jon Silva's P2P mix will come with two more DJ tools.

And a third remix has been done for Clubstar, namely for "Don't Stop" by W.V.P. pres. Mr. Da-Nos. Jon just took the vocals of the original and gave it a completely new Acid/Big Room rework around it. The remix has proven it's floor smashing qualities on the recent gigs on EXIT festival, Greece and at Cologne's Vic Bar. Watch out for this club tune!

Last but not least, there's also a new track by "The Mulder" (yes, that's also Jon) out on Plastic City called "Torque" that's among the best selling tunes on Beatport right now. The track is part of the Plastic city compilation "Play". A digital EP by "The Mulder" is on its way.

related tags: pesto 010r

Shortly after "Night Fever Remixes vol. 2" including remixes by Spin Science, Chris Niteshake, Steve Mill and Jon Silva has been released, Jon's "Babe-A-Pella" storms the sales charts, making his interpretation the best selling Plastic City track on beatport at the moment.

Another fact that is making us proud is that half of Plastic City's sales top ten consists of the various versions of "Night Fever". Thanks to all the supporters and of course the remixers - great job!

It's been a long time without any news being posted here so here you are:

Jon has been working on a large number of remix projects for several labels and artists. The first result of the "Summer of Remixes" will be available on Plastic City.

For the second volume of Soda Inc.'s "Night Fever Remixes", Jon joined the circle of Spin Science (Estonia), Chris Niteshake and Steve Mill (both from Greece) and delivers his "Babe-A-Pella", a deep and driving dub mix using only small portions of Jon's original vocals. Make sure you also check out Vol. 1 with remixes by G-Pal (Greece), Morgan Page (USA) and Roberto Bardini (Italy) which is also available on 12".
Volume 2 of the Night Fever Remixes is available from 26th June via beatport.com and tracktracker.com.

The next remixes have been requested by the guys from Moscow's Moonbeam Music. Jon made two remixes for "Home" by Moonbeam feat. Julia B:

The "Jon Silva Remix" is pure Jon Silva sound using warm Wurlitzer chords, a fat and funky bassline to create a deep atmosphere that carries Julia's vocals. The "Camouflage Remix" heads towards a darker, more electronic approach. You will also find a Dub of the "Camouflage Remix" without the vocals.
Moonbeam feat. Julia B - "Home" on Moonbeam Digital (MBD009) will be out on July 2nd.

Also from Russia comes the digital label Deepology, run by the guys that also form the "Luckystars" team (Conya). Jon was asked to remix Seva K's "Zero Gravity" and came up with his "Orbit Funk Mix", a fusion of classic House and Funk sounds with an electronic topping or, well, just "Orbit Funk", as Jon calls it.
Seva K - "Zero Gravity" on Deepology Digital (DD007) will be out by end of July 2007.

More remixes have been requested by other artists and labels, we will keep you posted about the progress in pt. 2 of our news bulletin that will be published soon.

We are more than proud and happy to announce that Simone's single "Luv" just entered the beatport House charts.

Currently, the "Be There Dub" is on #93 and we hope you will help us to make it gain more chart positions and have the other mixes enter the genre charts, as well. So far, thanks to all people that supported our actual release Pesto 008 "Luv" by Simone de Nauw.

Related links:
PestoCast 002 covering Simone de Nauw's "Luv"
DJ feedback on Pesto 008 - part one
direct link to Pesto 008 on beatport.com

related tags: pesto 008

We are proud to announce another radio guest mix by Jon Silva!

Our schäl sick Pestolero Henri Kohn, Cologne based house music soldier and artist & repertoire manager at the Clubstar label family invited Jon Silva to have a guest mix on his Clubstar Session on Radio 42. Henri's show kicks off at 09:00pm CET tomorrow on Saturday, the 24th March, Jon Silva's mix will be aired at 10:00pm CET.

Henri is known for his soulful House selections which makes the Clubstar Session a show to tune in regularly every Saturday. He also supports Pesto a lot and regularly has our releases in his charts - thanks a lot, Henri! Thanks to him, Jon Silva's "Love In Me" EP was signed to Conya and he also compiled and mixed the Clubstar Miami 007 Session (please see here) including Jon's stormer "Make It On Your Own".

Radio 42 is the House/Lounge channel of Raute FM, an online radio based in Germany. Make sure you check out their other channels as well.

Related links:
Radio 42
Clubstar web site
Henri Kohn web page
Henri Kohn's myspace

We are proud to announce that on Saturday, the 24th March you will hear a Soda Inc. guest DJ mix on our catalan Pestolera Carme Pastora's Hotmix show on Canal Blau FM.

If you are based in lovely Barcelone, you can tune in on 100.4FM, for all the rest of us, Canal Blau also offers a web stream. Carme's show starts at 05:00pm CET and is well worth a listen, the Soda Inc. mix will be aired at 06:00pm.

Besides being the show host, Carme was also recognized as the presenter of the spanish Deejay mag awards. Besides that, Carme is a loyal supporter of Pesto - ¡muchas gracias, guapita!

related links:
Carme's myspace profile
Canal Blau FM web stream

We're proud to announce that Jon Silva's "Music In Me" made it onto the Raisani Miami Sessions compilation, a compilation, you guessed it maybe, especially made for the Winter Music Conference that is about to launch today. Some of you might know the track "Music's In Me" already from Jon's myspace profile - this time you will get "The Optic Dub Mix" served.

Other artists on the tracklist are DJ Pap, Aston Martinez, David "Vibes" Tobon, Marshall Jefferson, Shyk Stilko, Tyree Cooper (the producer), DJ Tekin (you know one of his tunes from Jon Silva's "Sweet & Sexy" DJ mix), Raisani & Guidera and many, many more.

Look forward to an exclusive compilation with fresh and brand new tracks by today's hottest names in the House bizniz compiled by Haneef Raisani - the guy who's running Dubai's first and only House music label.

This is meant to serve you with fresh tunes just to pump out at WMC - Parteee!

Raisani Records homepage
Raisani Miami Sessions Disc 1 & 2

The Clubstar Family loaded the guns of their labels Clubstar, Conya, Soulstar and Little Angel labels to shoot upfront promo pressure on the southbeach dancefloors, pools and beaches.

'The Clubstar Family Miami 007 Session' is only available as digital download and it is exclusive on Traxsource. The compilation kicks of with the highly requested 'High Life Natural' track from Karu. This tune hasn't been released yet and is a bonus to Karu's artist album on Little Angel Records. Already included in the Harley & Muscle 'Deep House' compilation and the upcoming 'KaRavan' cd.

From the Soulstar label the compilation contains 2 tracks that are hammered by every bigname of the real house family: Martino's brand new remix of Physics 'So glad' and the magical Kevin Yost remix of Harley & Muscle deep house anthem 'Deeper Love'. The deep house dons from Milan are official WMC djs by the way, so don't forget to check them out when you are going loco in miami .

The compilation also contains the smasher "Make It On Your Own" from Jon Silva's hit single on Conya.

Those who purchase all 14 tracks will be rewarded with a special bonus dj mix by Clubstar and Conya A&R Henri Kohn, who is also responsible for the selection of this comp.

Enjoy the tunes and have fun in the sun!

Last weekend, L.A.'s Deep venue had Jay-J behind the decks. As Ricardo Torres was shooting with his cam, he caught Jay-J playing Jon Silva's Parapella of Roland Clark's "Deep In House" on Raisani Records.

Apparently, both Jay-J and the crowd enjoyed. ;)

Our friends from Moonbeam Music have just launched a brand new show on Proton Radio called "Moonbeam". There's a new episode of "Moonbeam" every second Monday of the month.

For the show on Monday, the 12th March they were so kind to invite Jon Silva for a guest mix on this episode. Make sure you check out the show "Moonbeam" on Proton Radio, hosted by our mates Pavel and Vitaliy Khvaleyev from Moonbeam. Special guest number two on this one is Jan Zyabovski, also from Russia.

Moonbeam Music Homepage

We are very proud to announce that we managed to sign another incredibly talented artist to the Pesto roster.

New York City based Rucyl Mills would be considered a songwriter or storyteller. Her lyrics are intimate and pure, carried by the voice of an angel. She has proven on several occasions that she is a professionally working performer. Next to releases on her own label, her resume lists vocal backups and performances as well as songwriting jobs.

She recently teamed up with no less talented producer Pete Gust from Stockholm, Sweden who just made an amazing remix of "Love In War". We are more than glad to offer you an outstanding release for this autumn including both the original and Pete's remix of which the latter already received tremendous feedback among DeepHouse lovers.

More information on Rucyl and Pete Gust will be published alongside the release of "Love In War" - so long, please make sure to check the following links:

Rucyl's myspace
Rucyl's web page (with links to more music - don't miss that!)
Pete Gust's myspace
Pete Gust's web page (also with bunches of more music!)

More good news for Jon Silva: Danny Howells played "Love In Me" from Jon's release on Conya017 in his latest Essential Mix on BBC Radio1 - the show of Pete Tong.

Check out the tracklist and the raving comments on BBC's page.

Thanks for the support, Danny!

We are proud to announce the release of Acryl 018 "Devotion" by Da Funk.

Next to top notch remixes of Replika and Edmund, Jon Silva did not want to step back and delivered two reworks of "Devotion". Please check out the web page of Acryl Music for promo reactions and availability.

Good luck with the release - we're sure it will be slamming!